(Shai Norton's random stuff about penguins and writing and … stuff.)

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Blurring Toward Clarity

I was supposed to have my cataract lasered out last week, which went remarkably well (considering I dread any procedure that involves my eyes) right up to the point where the laser broke down during my surgery prep.

Supposedly that had never happened before.

Everyone was amazed that I took the breakdown in stride and seemed gosh, cheerful, about having to reschedule. I should clarify that by ‘everyone,’ I mean my ophthalmologist and the folks at the surgical center, not @bhoneydew. He’s had a front-row seat for decades to how I break things just by being around them, especially when I’m a shade anxious. It could be fair to say that I’m relieved once they do break because the next steps suddenly become obvious.

It could be fair to say that, but I’m not.

The rescheduled operation went well, minus a minor glitch during the imaging process (which did point out that my eyeball wasn’t numb enough, so we were able to correct that before the surgery). I’m recovering both faster than I probably should and slower than I definitely want, which is to say, yes, I suck at resting, but at least I’m acknowledging that I need to be nice to myself.

About Shai

I’m an absolutely normal person. Abysmally normal. Hideously normal. So white bread and uptight that it’s not even funny. In some ways, I’m probably just like you, only repressed, unsociable or bound by a non-disclosure agreement.

I write. I analyze. I ask a lot of stupid questions. I solve problems, and I create new ones. I can break processes, software and brains (seemingly) simply by being in close proximity to them. That used to alarm me, then people started paying me to do it. I got over it.

I find data soothing.

I’m not sure I’ll ever finish going to school, because I don’t know everything yet and yeah, that bugs me. Sometimes, I have a mental soundtrack. That should bug me more than it does.

I’m married to a Certified Genius. We’re still trying to figure out this parenting thing (and pretty sure that it’d be easier to send a bag of cats to Mars). We have a son. Singular. We’ve had cats. Multiple. We like our son better, even if he’s more complicated.

Way more complicated.

We sometimes look at dog owners with blatant envy.

We move every four-five years or so. Six years ago, we relocated from Northeastern Pennsylvania to Northern Virginia. We’re twitching a little.

Modus Dementi is supposed to be Latin for ‘demented mode’, but since I don’t know Latin, it probably isn’t. Google Translate suggests that it’s ‘stupefied by the mode of’ … and I can’t argue with that at all.

I do, however, know French — a peu, parce que j’ai suivie de cours à l’université. Démenti means ‘contradiction’. The term’s often used to mean the official or formal denial of the truth of a report. I’m not quite sure what that says about this blog’s narrator.